Spiderweb Games - Jeff Vogel Roundup

Originally Posted by Dhruin
In my opinion, one of the biggest problems we have is people sympathising with pirates or minimising what they do - this is essentially what you are doing.

Since I report Vogel's stuff in our news, here's a look at his constant whining about piracy.

1. This article. It's as much about looking after your customers but let's count it.
2. Interview at RPG Codex. Nothing on piracy.
3. Blog on the iphone. Nothing about piracy.
4. How Many Games I Sell #2. Nothing on piracy.
5. How Many Games I Sell #1. Yep, talks about piracy.
6. First blog post. Nothing about piracy.
7. Interview at Reason.com. Nothing on piracy.
8. GameBanshee interview. Nothing on piracy.
9. View From the Bottom piece at RPG Vault. Nothing on piracy.
10, View From the Bottom #9 at RPG Vault. Nothing on piracy.

Right. Two out of the last 10 pieces he has done mention piracy. One is an article on his sales (do you think it might be relevant?) and one is about how looking after your customers is the best way to go.

The bastard.

Now, get your facts straight and stop supporting pirates by whinging about something that isn't even there.

I agree with you completely. I must admit I've been puzzled by some of the sentiments expressed in this thread.

Here we have a guy that makes (IMHO) quality RPG's. He releases huuge demos, so you can be absolutely sure whether a game's worth spending money on or not. Additionally he has a very non-intrusive copy protection solution. Still he gets pepper for talking about how he feels about piracy.

pibbur

I did my own search again for his articles and couldn't find anymore besides those two and I was probably thinking about all the other articles that have been on here about piracy. I am sorry about blowing up at Jeff Vogel and I don't think he has been over complaining about piracy.

PS. I wasn't trying to minimise or sympathise with pirates but I don't like it when people are complaining about one subject over and over like other people do about piracy. Piracy is just the subject that has been getting most of that and constantly complainging about it isn't going to do anything about it except to annoy people.

PPS. Again sorry about putting this all on jeff vogel but I have been getting iritated for awhile since I have been seeing so many articles on piracy here when I am coming here for information on rpgs and not piracy.

Originally Posted by guenthar
PPS. Again sorry about putting this all on jeff vogel but I have been getting iritated for awhile since I have been seeing so many articles on piracy here when I am coming here for information on rpgs and not piracy.

I'd say RPGWatch does a good job of sticking to its focus and only occasionally wandering into general PC or gaming news territory.

It's a sad thing, but piracy is simply too big a factor not to discuss, both for the gaming industry in general as for RPG-specific sites. RPGWatch would be doing a bad job of it if they try to skirt the issue of piracy for no clear reason.

Originally Posted by guenthar
PPS. Again sorry about putting this all on jeff vogel but I have been getting iritated for awhile since I have been seeing so many articles on piracy here when I am coming here for information on rpgs and not piracy.

guenthar I really don't want to jump on you too, but so many? What do you mean? Piracy gets talked about sometimes, but it's not like in every thread or even in the majority of them. Even so, if they were it is because it is relevant to our little hobby here.

Originally Posted by txa1265
I can't believe how clueless he is about the state of RPG's … he speaks as if he has a clue about ToEE based on glancing at Metacritic? I lost a heap of respect for him based on the crap he spewed in that article.

I disagree with him 100% on basically everything he said. Reading it made me angry. But, I have gained a tremendous amount of respect for Vogel by him being business-retarded. He told the brutal honest truth knowing his customers wouldn't like what he said, as a small business owner. He could have easily have taken the fluff-market-speech aproach of bioware, but had the balls and the integrity to tell it exactly how he sees it, bottom-line hurt or not. You have to respect that.

His words made me want to drag my hairy-stinky testicles across his face and rub them forcefully in his eyeballs until he cries for his mommy and takes back his insane words of stupid, but at the same time i want to shake his hand for being a bigger, better, and more honest man than I would be in his situation (even though I wouldn't be in his situation because I have imaculate taste in crpgs and I'm not insane).

At the end of the day, he makes games I like somehow, and regardless of how he gets from a to b, b is pretty f**king good and worth my money.